Here's How Much America REALLY Spends On Israel's Defense

Last week the Jerusalem Post
reported that former Israeli Defense Force (IDF)
Commander-in-Chief Gabi Ashkenazi told a
conference that U.S. taxpayers have contributed more to
the Israeli defense budget than Israeli taxpayers in the
past three years.

This comment has been passed around everywhere.

Alison Weir of Veterans News Now
pointed out it was the first instance of
anIsraeli leader saying that U.S. taxpayers
contribute more money to Israel's defense budget than Israeli
taxpayers.

But the claim seemed fishy to us.

Given that U.S. military
aid to Israel was $2.775 billion in 2010, $3 billion in 2011,
$3.07 billion in 2012 (and $3.15 billion per year from 2013-2018)
while Israel's defense budget is around $15 billion, it made
us wonder how much Israeli taxpayers contribute and where the
other $12 billion non-U.S. aid comes from.

We emailed Shmuel Even, an expert of
Israel's defense at the Institute for National Security
Studies in Tel Aviv, who told us that Israel's up-to-date
defense budget for 2012 is $15 billion, with 70 percent
contributed by Israeli taxpayers, 21 percent coming from U.S. aid
and 9 percent coming from Defense Ministry income.

That would put the Israeli taxpayer contribution at $10.5
billion, compared to $3.15 billion from the U.S. (Even added
that the U.S. aid in 2011 was $3.1 billion and that most of the
aid comes in weapons as opposed to cash.)

So was Lt. Gen. Ashkenazi—who served as the IDF supreme
commander from 2007 to 2011—simply mistaken? Or is he
alluding to something that one of Israel's top researchers
doesn't know?

Shmuel Even watched the video of Ashkenazi's
speech and said the former IDF chief "said it, but I
don't know why."

Even added that Ashkenazi "also
said that the U.S. military aid is $3B. So he
knows the numbers."